


Intricate Rituals

by hubblegleeflower



Series: Favourite Ficlets [10]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: First Time, M/M, Roughhousing, everything turns to sex with these people, have you noticed that?, wrestling that turns to sex, you construct intricate rituals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-20
Updated: 2016-06-20
Packaged: 2018-07-16 03:39:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7250482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hubblegleeflower/pseuds/hubblegleeflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock thinks boys roughhousing is stupid and annoying. John thinks it's sweet. Sherlock ends up changing his opinion somewhat, by the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Intricate Rituals

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SamanthaLenore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamanthaLenore/gifts).



> Based on a post by sussexbound (SamanthaLenore on AO3):  
>  _Also, as like an extension to THIS, imagine the epic rough-housing John and Sherlock will get into, because Sherlock is martial arts trained, and John would be trained in hand-to-hand combat from his military days, and since they are both just boys at heart, when they really feel free to touch one another, there is going to be so much rough housing, and Mrs. Hudson will just be rolling her eyes downstairs._  
>  And a follow up from 1895itsallfine (not sure if they're on here) asking for someone to fic it!

“Oh, please.”

John looks up at Sherlock’s sound of disgust and follows his gaze across the green. Through the trees, he spots a gaggle of young men and his blogger’s mind presents him with words like _rambunctious_ and _frolic_ and _disporting_ (though he does wonder about that last one). From what he can tell, they’re enjoying the sunshine with a good, rowdy rough-and-tumble, and he can’t see what’s got Sherlock’s goat.

“What?”

Sherlock huffs and scoffs in the general direction of the scampering youths. “That sort of nonsense. The noise and the rough play and their absolute conviction that they’re the only people in the park - in the world - of any consequence right now.”

“Well, to them, they are.” John can remember - just barely - feeling that way. It seems a long time ago.

“Exactly my point.” A dismissive gesture. “And all for that kind of thinly-veiled homoerotic _prancing about_ \- “

“Homoero - ? Why should you care if they’re prancing…?”

“Because they’re precisely the sorts of louts who would deny it to their last breath if anyone commented, and likely land a punch on anyone who was admitting it too freely, despite their seeking every possible pretense to touch their fellows in as intimate a manner as possible.”

John’s mental triage - which point to pursue first? - takes him a moment. “Hang on,” he says. He’s rather inclined to view their antics benignly, and resents Sherlock for begrudging them their fun. “First of all, you don’t know anything about them, or their attitudes, and you can’t tell me you’ve deduced them just because they’re making too much noise in the park.”

“Balance of probability.”

“Second of all, there is absolutely no reason to conclude that homoeroticism enters into it in the slightest. They could just be friends larking about.”

Sherlock’s eyebrow twitches.

“No, they could. They probably are. Didn’t you do that sort of thing when you were at uni, with your mates…?” _What the hell are you even saying, Watson?_ But it’s out, now. “Or as a kid…?” _Not better._

“No. Though I did have ample opportunity to observe those other…attitudes, as you call them. More than sufficient to deduce them from this distance, since any closer would have been unwise.”

John files this away but holds stubbornly to his point. “I’m just saying that friendly wrestling can be, and in most cases is, exactly that. Innocent. _Friendly_.”

“Friendly.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sure you’re right, John. For example, the fellow in the blue jersey with his legs wrapped around his… _friend_ ’s waist from behind. Completely innocent, especially the three fingers slotted in between the buttons of his shirt at nipple height.”

 _Sherlock said ‘nipple’._ “I…what?” Sure enough, the lad in question has at least half a hand shoved inside the other boy’s shirt, and his legs are locked at the ankles. He looks radiant. They both do. “Oh.”

“Quite. Very friendly, just as you say. I’ll defer to your expertise in this area, of course.”

“Stop being a tit. I’m just saying, roughhousing between friends can be good, plain fun, and you’ve never done it, so you don’t know.”

Sherlock is silent. They walk on, leaving the disorderly youths behind them. “Anyway, kids’ attitudes have changed a lot since we were that age. Some of them don’t deny it. And a lot of the others don’t feel the need to hit them. Their friends might just be glad for them.”

John thinks of their shining faces and hopes this is true.

Sherlock only hums absently and says nothing, and they get to Baker Street without further discussion.

***

John remembers how it was to be those kids. All of those kids, gambolling like so many puppies, and those specific two boys, seeking what contact they could find and glowing with it.

He can almost feel the press of a broad back against his own chest, the warmth of smooth skin against the tips of his fingers. He can almost smell the warm neck, the heat of a familiar body.

(In spite of the position he has taken in this argument - _innocent_ \- he knows what was gleaming out of their faces. He remembers, though it’s been a long, long time.)

(Since anything shone out of his face so unconsciously.)

***

No sooner have they stepped into the sitting room, though, than long arms wrap around him from behind, at waist and throat, with a complicated weaving through the elbows that leaves him more or less immobilised.

Sod that. Instinct kicks in and he bends his body and hooks his foot, breaking the hold, and taking his assailant down in the same motion. He is not entirely surprised to see that his “assailant” is, in fact, his flatmate, looking only slightly nonplussed.

“What the fuck, Sherlock?” John relaxes his hold - only to have Sherlock twist beneath him and spring free, leaping to his feet in one movement and knocking John off-balance in  the next.

John’s reflexes aren’t what they were, but he catches himself before he falls and gets himself steady on his feet, arms at the ready. “Do you mind telling me what the hell is going on?”

“Roughhousing, John.” Sherlock is standing normally, apparently at ease, but in the next moment he’s grasped John’s arm and twisted him so that his back is pressed against Sherlock’s front - this time with a long leg between his knees preventing him from escaping. “You said I should try it.”

“I said you should…?” John swallows as his body settles back against Sherlock’s, _warm firm tight,_ and quickly shifts his thoughts to finding a way to break the hold that doesn’t involve an elbow to his friend’s gut or a head to his chin. “I don’t think I did.”

“Good clean fun, you called it. And you’re right, this is quite enjoyable. I didn’t think you’d be quite this easily beaten, though.”

“Roughhousing is one thing. Baritsu is quite another.” John goes abruptly limp and falls out of Sherlock’s hold, hitting the floor in a roll and taking out Sherlock’s long legs with a two-handed yank on his ankles. He goes down hard. “And who says I’m beaten?”

It degenerates quickly after this, the crisp discipline of Sherlock’s martial arts training and the blunt efficiency of John’s military hand-to-hand fighting swiftly turning sloppy, hands grasping wildly, bodies rolling, legs taking out unwary bits of furniture and an arm or two that is actually flailing in there somewhere. Neither man wants to cede to the other, and although neither is willing to do any actual damage, it seems unlikely to end well.

Bit by bit John becomes aware of another problem, too, as he rolls his body over Sherlock’s and reaches around him. He hooks a leg over Sherlock’s hips from behind, wraps an arm around his shoulders, and in the next instant he’s faced with a vision of the two boys in the park, and their radiant faces.

Abruptly, the mood feels…different.

Oh. _The press of a broad back, the scent of a warm neck, the brush of soft skin. A close, beloved body._ His arms tighten, and it isn’t a combat tactic.

Immediately, Sherlock goes still in his arms. There is nothing to dislodge him from where his face lies buried in unruly curls, so he stays there. Arms tight around Sherlock’s body, breathing deep into his neck.

Three breaths, four. If he moves, he’ll have to say something. Another breath. His heart rate from the wrestling is settling down, but he is holding Sherlock’s body and breathing into his hair. He is anything but calm.

Sherlock only stirs again after John has stopped counting his breaths, and even then it is only to move a hand, very slowly, until it is hovering just over where John’s fingers are spread against his chest.

“John,” he begins, and leaves the question hanging.

“Yeah.” John does not raise his read, and he’s not sure what he’s giving assent to. Perhaps just responding to his name.

“I don’t - I don’t know this trick.” His voice is a little breathless. John can’t see his face.

Instead he sees the beaming face of the boy in the park. _To hell with it._

“Not a trick,” he says.  Another deep breath of damp neck, in case he’s about to be thrown off. “Tell me to let go and I will.”

Sherlock doesn’t. His hovering hand comes to rest - lightly - over John’s. “Is this what you meant by  _friendly wrestling_?” There is little sting in his tone.

“Um…”

“Is it innocent, John?” His voice is small.

“Innocent?” Here John does raise his head. Because he knows what Sherlock means, and he’s clearly lost this argument, but this is one point he isn’t going to concede. “ _Yes_. Fucking yes. I wasn’t, I’m not trying to take advantage, Sherlock. I'm not...what did you say? Looking for any possible pretense. I wasn’t looking, but when I…I’m not pretending, okay? And I won’t deny it, not ever. Not ever again. To anyone.”

He blinks as he hears the truth of his own words. He couldn’t have said that when he was nineteen - _or forty-one -_ but he means it now. The realisation makes his mouth twitch.

He goes on. “As for innocent, I, um…It can be as innocent as you want it to be.”

Sherlock is silent for a beat. Then he takes the hand John has pressed against his chest and moves it down his torso. With a gasp, John catches his intent just as he settles John’s hand down on the front of his trousers. His, um, position is quite clear.

For a moment he can barely breathe. Then, “Not entirely innocent, then?”

A breathy chuckle. “Not at all. If. If you’re offering.”

John allows his fingers to curl around the bulge in Sherlock’s trousers, and he glories in the sharp intake of breath it elicits when he does. “I’m offering.” A thought strikes him, though, and his hand stills. “But, um, not just…not just playing, Sherlock. If I’m offering, if you take it…it’s not pretend. It’s not just…” Oh, god, to have come this far and now…

“Not just larking about.”

“Yes. No. Right. Not just…no.” His breath leaves him all in a rush, and he has to pause to fill his lungs again. “So are you, do you want…? What I’m offering?”

Sherlock turns, then, rolls over in his arms to face him. It dislodges his hand from Sherlock’s erection but it is worth it to see his open, shining face. “Yes, John. Yes, all of it.”

John knows that everything he’s feeling is beaming out of his face and he spares the space in his thoughts to note that he feels positively radiant, incandescent like the boys in the park, or more, much more - before he lifts his face to claim his kiss.

(What follows is at least as hazardous to the flat and furniture as their roughhousing session, but on a hunch - bred of hope and a colourful past of her own - Mrs. Hudson does not venture up the stairs to complain.)

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this work references [Barbara Kruger's untitled work](http://www.mfa.org/collections/object/untitled-you-construct-intricate-rituals-35582), which contains the caption, "You Construct Intricate Rituals Which Allow You to Touch the Skin of Other Men."


End file.
